It was June 1992 when a boy and a girl from Taylor Street in Chicago’s Little Italy said “I do!” for the first time in Windy City – and thus Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding came to town and stayed for the incredible 16 years. Remounted to rave reviews in the fall of 2016, the show has hosted thousands of guests and continues to entertain Chicago patrons of all ages.

Join us as we gather to celebrate Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding in Chicago’s 25th Anniversary!

A special anniversary show featuring the past and current cast and creative team members will take place on Friday, June 16th, 8:00 pm (click herefor tickets.) Our special guests that night will include Paul Stroili (Vinnie Black, and Director of the current production), Rose Dalessandro (Tina), Dan Montano (Barry Wheeler), David Viggiano (Joey), John Dalesandro (Nunzio, Sr.), Peter DeFaria (Michael Just), Suzanne McNulty (Aunt Rose), Marssie Mencotti (Josephine Vitale, and Grandma Nunzio in the current production), Desiree Irwin-Poupko (Photographer’s Assistant/Swing), Liz Cohen (Band Member/Musical Director), and Maude Graham-Nieds (Stage Manager). More guests to be confirmed.

Please share your stories and photos of Tony n’ Tina over the years and around the globe. You can post them on Instagram with hashtags #tonyntina25 or #tonyntinamemories. You can also send us your memories of Tony n’ Tina’s weddings you attended: please email them to family@tonylovestina.com*

*Entrants agree to give the producers of Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding the right to use and publicize their photos and stories.

“They came on Congolese time,” she reports, so they missed the Tony n’ Tina ceremony and procession. At Guy Fieri’s American Kitchen and Grill, the three guys saw the bride and the groom, sat at their table with the beautiful red and white flower centerpiece and zebra stripe motif tablecloths and chair-backs set by the stunning Karen Corcoran, –which all immediately define the Tony n’ Tina experience as “Wedding.” They accepted the reality and sat down.

In 1997 at fifteen years old, Simba walked out of Lumbumbashi, then Zaire, when her parents’ tribes were at war. She made her way to New York and attended Newcomer’s High School in Queens. “We had students from 143 countries and even more languages spoken since most of the students spoke several languages especially the African students,” she reports, “I speak six languages.” Two of the guys she brought to Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding were from Kinchasa, and one from Kisangani, now the war torn Democratic Republic of the Congo. All have made New York City their home.

The first rustle in the fabric of reality came when the pasta and salad was served. The three guys asked for goat. “What kind of a wedding doesn’t serve meat and fish? See if the kitchen has goat meat.” Simba obliged and asked the caterers, the Black family—if there was any meat and fish.

“I went up the one who doesn’t smile and asked if they had fish.” (Nikki Black – played by powerhouse Concetta Rose Rella) “She looked at me in that way with that attitude and said, “Fish? The restaurant belongs to my Dad and I don’t care.” Then I went to the one in the blue dress. (Loretta Black played by superstar Susan Campanaro) and she came up to my friends and said, “The bride is Vegan so just eat what you got.”

“Your friends are weird,” the guys agreed, “who doesn’t have fish and goat at a wedding?” They sat politely and pretended that everything was fine, chocking it up to cultural differences. “Maybe this is the way it is in America.”

Grandma Nunzio visited their table and the three guys all said that they’d love to meet some nice American girls at the wedding, so Grandma obliged and brought them chicks all night long to talk and dance with. They seemed happy, but as Tony n’ Tina’s bizarre plot unwound and the characters come apart at the seams, the three guys became disconcerted and agitated.

“Wait the bride is drunk,” one said.

“The father in law is drunk,” said the second.

“Blasphemy! The mother-in-law and father-in-law are kissing!” yelled the third. And I saw the aluminum foil going to the tables. I am sure they are giving meat to some people just not us. Look, but don’t let them see you look. You see the aluminum foil going around?”

“Don’t tell the white people we are complaining.”

“The ex-boyfriend just stole the gift I saw him.”

“This wedding is bad. I heard the bride say she’s pregnant by the ex-boyfriend.”

The first guy began questioning the reality of it all. He’s a producer who runs the annual “Africa Awards.” He knows shows. The second guy, a documentary film cinematographer was ready to leave when Loretta Black pulled him to the dance floor and opened his shirt. He danced shirtless with all the groomsmen. “Ok,” he reasoned, “if it’s a crazy party we can be crazy too.”

At the end of the night Simba told the three, “I have to tell you. This is a play.” The first one laughed and accepted the fact, “Oh! It’s a show.” The second said, “But what kind of show is this?” and the third, a real estate agent refused to believe her. “No no no. This is not a play. This cannot be a play. She just doesn’t want to admit she has weird friends.”

Times Square, New York City. This is the center of the grid. Some quick googling procures this figure: 161 megawatts of electricity are used in Times Square at any one time. One megawatt can power 1,000 U.S. homes. Performing in a show in Times Square, we actors have our own human-megawatt ways of measuring. The energy produced through song, drama, and dance in all of the Broadway and off-Broadway houses in any moment can be measured only in the audiences’ smiles. This is our contract, this energy exchange between us, this light we make in the night. Night holds magic and surprise. Once you get behind the theater door and into your seat you are open to the spiritual commerce about to take place.

In Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding, this experience is a level deeper. Playing “Grandma” I get to sit at many of the wedding guests’ tables, and we talk. That’s my role. To sit and connect with the people. I ask them their names and where they’re from. I take my photos out of my wallet with pictures of the old neighborhood and the old country. I talk with the grandmothers and grandfathers. I listen, as they scoot closer to me and tell me what they must. With some I connect deeper than with people I know in life and will see repeatedly. The chance to play Grandma gives me the opportunity to transform into a super hero of listening.

As I get into the wig and gown with the help of stellar wardrobe manager Rodney Harper and become Grandma, my superhero power is to engage others. She goes into the crowd, hands out butterscotch balls and connects to people’s nostalgia. It’s magic. Some hearts open instantly as she unsnaps her purse. In my conversation, I age up a generation, I talk about pushcart peddlers and icemen and WWII and the times when doctors made house calls, and all of the Bronx stories I know from my parents’ generation. We talk about the way things used to be. We take photos, and then, later, I tweet and blog about it. I can see when the elders in the audience enter their own memory bank, prodded by the world of the wedding. I remember them for long after, the antique jewelry they wore for the occasion, the stories they told, their initial reluctance to get up out of the security of their chairs and their joy when they venture to the dance floor with a steady arm to escort them. I remember their gratitude for a hot cup of coffee brought by Loretta Black, or a bag of ice to nurse their knee.

We all have the same needs, not the same level at the same moment, but in the suspended clock of theater, in that eternal bliss where three hours feels like a lifetime – we believe we are related, and in truth, a truth much too vast to comprehend, we are.

The other night, I pulled the I.V. outta my hand, bandaged it up and drove cross-town to perform in Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding – Off-Broadway in Times Square. I took my pneumonia and walked out with nebulizer meds and loaded on Prednisone, “which will give you a Superman feeling like you can do anything,” my nurse told me.

In our dressing room, I wore my hospital robe as I got into my wig, makeup, and costume and performed. I’ve performed sick and with fevers before, high fevers. If I was the type to wait until I was “well” in life, I’d never do anything, and so, sweating – and breathing deliberately – I perform. I got through college with a tumor the size of a basketball in my chest; so nothing will stop me now – unless it truly stops me. Performing is the cure. Living is the mandate. This show has a deep level of devotion for a reason no one can know unless we tell you, so here it is. We are all here for many different reasons but with a common root: that this is the cherry on top of the struggle for survival – a belief that what we are doing has a spiritual and life purpose and is for the good in the world. I’ve heard at least one actor express this in spiritual terms: it’s a sense of mission to make people happy and to bring joy to hundreds.

I have a deep spiritual connection with my producers, Joe Corcoran and Karen Cellini. Here’s our story. I was teaching a theater workshop at my alma mater, Sarah Lawrence College. I brought my favorite prop with me, a branch from my grandmother’s peach tree. I have the branch covered with red, white, and blue wool fringe and brass keys that ring like bells. One woman in the class, Karen Cellini, took her turn with the grandma branch, and as soon as she held and danced with it, we were both hit with the same feeling and words: “when are we gonna work together?” In our first meeting to talk one-on-one, Karen said, you have to meet my husband Joe Corcoran. And the rest was destiny, and now, it’s theater history.

Joe and I connected immediately about our shared medical history. We are both alumnae of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. He had lung cancer, and I had Hodgkin’s Disease at eighteen years old and later Thyroid Cancer as a result of the radiation treatments. Joe and I shared, on a deep level, this question of – given a lifespan challenged and threatened by grave cancer, what are you going to do with the god-given time you have? And we both have the same friggin’ answer: “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding – Times Square 2014.”

Catharsis cures. You gotta live while you’re alive. That’s the bottom line we agree on. Otherwise, what’s all the suffering good for? You have to go out and have a good giant laugh and cry. This is ancient. You gotta dance around the fire and open your lungs. We all need this and we need it together. I know if you talk to all 27 cast members, plus the crew, you’ll find more stories with the same rally cry: we need to do this. It makes life worth it. And it’s this deep bond that shines this show to a radiant sheen. You will shine when you leave and carry that with you.

Chances are I’ll end up back on the east side in urgent care, and I know that when I do, I’m gonna rip off that hospital bracelet and head west to Times Square for showtime. I’m gonna keep going west, to the stage. To Broadway. To 44th and 7th Ave. To the fun. The gioia di vivere. To Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding to become Grandma Nunzio, who never was sick a day in her life! I’m gonna keep doing the tarantella, eating garlic and boil ginger, and taking my herbs and yelling and clearing my lungs. As we used to say in the Bronx in the 60s, I will “keep on truckin.”

I went to so many Italian American weddings all throughout my life that I never felt the need to go to “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding” throughout the 80’s and 90’s. I had so many cousins and one by one they all walked down the aisle and I had lived through all the agida (stomach agitation) and all the acida (stomach acid) with the families, –who don’t talk to who, who can’t sit near who, who don’t like who, who owes who money, who don’t like what the other one does, what groom is going with what bridesmaid, what indiscretions did the guys do for their bachelor party antics, etcetera.

I knew from an early age that I’d never be the bride, the lady in the big white dress shaped like a fountain who takes her father’s arm and is “given away.” There was something I hated about weddings. I remember looking up that giant aisle in 1971 when I was a flower girl at Santa Maria Church in the Bronx for my brother’s wedding. He just got home from being a Marine serving in Viet Nam. His fiancè told me to hold her nephew’s hand, the ring bearer, and walk up the aisle. I couldn’t do it. I looked him in the eye and refused to hold his hand. If I had to walk that plank, I was doing it alone. Bride after bride I watched walk that walk, dance that dance with the father, and I watched all the ice swans melt as the Venetian Hours were raved about.

Now I am “in” the wedding. I play “Grandma Nunzio” in the 25th anniversary show of “Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding” – in Times Square. I invite people to come to a show I never got around to see myself. I hear from a lot of Italian Americans, “I never saw that. I never felt the need. I went to so many Italian American weddings as it was.” I hear that over and over and I remember that feeling. So I came up with a list of reasons why Italian American New Yorkers must see this show, this time, in Times Square.

There is no where else you can do the tarentella in New York City with a group of 200 strangers.

You can let out all the years of all the problems of all the family weddings you’ve ever been to, and purge the memories and tell the stories.

You can sing along with Louis Prima hits, and sing to me, Grandma.

I will give you a butterscotch ball and whisper “Mangia” the way your Grandma did to you and make you cry with nostalgia.

Like the greatest of Fellini images, we gotta live with the surrealismo of who we are as a culture.

Commedia dell’arte is in our blood. We are natural born improvisers, story tellers, pranksters.

This show has a magic formula. Fun. Food. Song. Dance. Family fights.

You will walk away whistling, and sing in the days after.

You will want to come back and bring your friends and family.

You can let loose. Talk with the characters about your family. Complain all you want. It’s cheap therapy, I’d say about two grand worth for the price of a ticket.

New Yorkers are great to party with. Come hang out all night.

You will never experience Times Square like this, in a wedding procession of 200 plus us characters.

It’s the fun without the aggravation. For once, you can laugh at the family dramatics, instead of getting twisted.

Vino. Pasta. Cake.

Tarentella, live singing, live dancing, gorgeous actors who put out tons of energy for your entertainment.

Hear real Bronx accents.

Striptease. Rap. Crooning. Conga Line. Mambo Italiano.

Everything except the Hokey Pokey. But we can do that on the sidelines.

Bring your memories and your dancing shoes, and don’t miss the best most therapeutic party for Italian American New Yorkers.

Will the ex-boyfriend get back the bride? Will the bride’s mother strangle her daughter by the end of the night? Who will the groom’s father take home? Will the groom get fed up and split? Can the caterer’s wife save the day with her voracious Mambo Italiano? Will the bride’s mother jump the groom’s father? What’s Grandma doing in the men’s room? Will the caterer’s daughter run away with the cake? Will the priest drink everyone under the table? Will the bride’s brother recover from his kiss on the lips from the groom’s father? Will the stripper catch the bouquet? Will the nun run away with the groomsman? Will the pregnant Maid of Honor give birth right on the dancefloor? Will the sexy Wedding Singer get the bridesmaid?

Three Italian American families go 13 rounds in 3 1/2 hours to find out. It’s the Nunzios v. the Vitales with Vinnie Black and his clan saving the day.

THE NUNZIOS

The father to the groom is a Bronx Mamma’s boy who runs a strip joint and blames his youngest son for his first wife’s dissappearance. He caters to his domineering mother who bemoans the loss of the old ways. The groom is fed up with the status quo strip joint family mentality.

THE VITALES

The mother of the bride grieves vociferously the recent loss of her husband. Her flamboyant son puts a song, silk, and a smile on every moment. The bride has a total meltdown.

THE BLACKS

The catering company make their children miserable with their festive comedy routines and song and dance. They keep the party going above the fray, fights, utter fiasco.

The hallmark of Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding is the street procession that has been taking audience / wedding revelers on a walk through New York City streets for twenty-five years. That’s how New Yorkers know the show, by witnessing this procession that has taken place thousands of times. What a blessed thing. It is our streets that bring us together in New York. It is our walking.

Street processions are a profound aspect of Italian American culture, religious festivals, and rites of passage. Remember Michael Corleone’s Sicilian wedding procession with live band? Ever been to a Giglio feast in Williamsburg or East Harlem where the six story tower and statue is carried on a group’s shoulders? Ever visit a small town in Italy during their religious procession around the town piazza?

Don’t you love the processions in Fellini films?!

Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding procession from the ceremony to the reception is bigger, better and more exciting than ever. We walk through Times Square enmasse. Two hundred people from all walks of life and all corners of the globe walk together through the neon lit night and omnipresent traffic from The Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School for International Careers on 46th Street between 6th & 7th Ave., to the reception party at Guy Fieri’s American Kitchen and Bar, on 44th between 7th & 8th Ave. We walk right through Shubert Alley to our reception party. Tony in his white tux, and Tina in her Kleinfeld super gown lead the way. The bridesmaids and groomsmen and family and friends mingle enroute. Grandma Nunzio gets pushed speedily and wildly by her grandson Johnny, but her lucky cane hooks him behind the neck to steer him through traffic. Grandma doesn’t like to wait for the traffic she likes to part it.

Dante began his trilogy with these immortal words: “Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita…” In the middle of the walk of our life… Come take this walk friends, this walk of New York, this wedding night when New Yorkers truly take back New York. Come walk with us and let the lights surround you.

As an event planner for nonprofits and corporations, it’s always a challenge to find new and innovative event ideas. Businesses are looking to entertain clients and conduct team building events and nonprofits are always in search of the next great “gala” idea. When Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding Producer Joe Corcoran reached out to me to join the promotion team, I thought this would be a terrific opportunity to get the inside scoop on such an iconic show. From a planner’s perspective, Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding is an exciting, interactive, totally unique venue for a special event, but I had to see for myself. I gathered a group of family, friends and clients for their first performance before a live audience.

As we congregated before the ceremony, everyone was chatting and catching up, excited to see what the evening would bring. Before we knew it, Tony’s handsome groomsmen were mingling with us and psyching Tony up for his big walk down the aisle. Next, as we descended the winding staircase at Guy’s American Kitchen & Bar, we were greeted by the fabulous Loretta Black who is co-owner and proprietor with her husband Vinnie Black of Vinnie Black’s Coliseum, the “it” place for weddings, according to Loretta. After we were ushered to our seats for the reception we had the opportunity to mingle with the other members of the wedding party. Uncle Louie will plop himself down at your table and give you the business and Grandma Nunzio will make sure you are up to date on her new hip. Before long, you really forget that you and your friends are there for a show and feel like you are a guest at a real wedding…full of crazy people.

The experience is immersive, fun and constantly changing based on where you are sitting, standing or dancing. Bridesmaids and groomsmen ask you to get up and dance. Tina’s mother compliments your “smoking hot dress” and Tony’s father, well, he’s very smooth.

Social media plays a big role in the production as well. Flat screen TVs are positioned around the room featuring the guests’ live tweets and Instagrams with customizable hashtags. Guests can party in person and in the Twittersphere.

The beautiful thing about the Tony n’ Tina experience is that it can be customized for any group. How special would it be for the CEO or honoree to give a toast to the bride and groom or have a VIP client dance with the mother of the bride? Nonprofits planning their next big fundraiser should consider Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding instead of the usual sit-down gala. Something new and exciting is always a draw for attendees and sponsors. The nonprofits and their sponsors can get their message or products promoted during the wedding in a creative way. The possibilities are endless and that’s what makes it so exciting.

At the end of the night, my group left with their heads spinning and big smiles. Mission accomplished.

The audience creates the show. Each table is different. Last night we had a table of adventurous Russian tourists, a table of wise elder Italian American ladies / gamblers, a beautiful Puerto Rican family who drove in from Pennsylvania, then there was the famous fashion designer, and the big table of 20’ something hot girls, and a table of 40’ something women. That’s just the beginning. Our audience is diverse. This is Times Square. The whole world is here. Children who come get involved in the “Champagne March.” One girl, Catherine, celebrated her 17th birthday. That’s a birthday to remember.

As members of the wedding party amble from table to table, the story builds. It’s a different show at every table. The elder Italian American ladies gave Madalyn Monroe love advice, saying Nunzio was paying too much attention to Josephine Vitale. And they told me, Grandma Nunzio, their favorite numbers to play Lotto, and about the slot machines at the Sands. Each night a rivalry gets heated up between the two families; the Vitales and the Nunzios. Johnny Nunzio and Dominick Fabrizzi rev up the Nunzio side of the crowd in a cheer. The bridesmaids, Sister Terry, Aunt Rose, and Josephine Vitale heat up the Vitale side of the crowd. You never know what’s going to happen, who you will dance with, or which way the conversation goes. Last night I had an accountant who could really dance, and the night before, an actor hell bent on making out with Grandma Nunzio!

Our director Tony Lauria had us stand in a circle before the show, radiating outward in the order that we were cast. Some have been in Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding since the beginning or close to it – 25 years. This is New York’s wedding. We should make a wedding book, with photos and essays from over the decades reflecting on all that’s changed and all that remains the same.

First, archetypes. Tonight I got to keep alive in me, through being Grandma Nunzio, all the strong women in our ancestry. I thought of my aunts, my godmother, my grandmothers and great-grandmothers, my mother most of all – as I primp and dive into the wig – I become them. I take on their stories and their rock solid spirits.

Second, gioia di vivere, joie di vivre, the joy of living. Tonight a young man proposed to his girlfriend, there on the spot, on Tony n’ Tina’s dancefloor. He took the microphone, spoke his truth and sprung open a box with the diamond ring. She said yes. The whole crowd erupted with a cheer. We are here to celebrate the cycle of life. Love, amore, is the heart of this show.

Third, Italian American dramatic culture. We all grew up with drama. Sore, frati, cane, gatti, our proverbs tell us: Sisters, brothers, dogs, cats. We fight. We let it out. We yell. We throw things. One audience member, non-Italian, observed that this show “exposes the mind.” You mean other people don’t express themselves this way? Seriously? They don’t give each other the evil eye and say exactly what’s on their mind? Come on people, that’s what curse words are for. Curses are our way of barking. If you don’t like to curse, try vowel sounds. My grandmother used to yell, “Eeeeeeeeeee!” with her right arm shooting straight up into the air. Try it. Feels great.

Fourth, this is real. Interaction. Watch dogs in a field. Puppies in a box. Clouds in a windy sky. Interaction. We are here at Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding and it is reality. Last night, I found a gorgeous silver bracelet on the dance floor near a table. I asked several women if it was theirs – no. I handed it to the manager who was going to make an announcement. Later I asked another lady, “Did you lose a bracelet? I found one.” “Oh my God,” she said, “yes. Really. No for real.” I said, “I know, I found it.” She said, “No, for real. For real.” I had to convince her, with witnesses, that I wasn’t joking, that this was real, that I was real, that this wasn’t part of a play. I had to calm her. I am thinking of Magritte’s “Ceci n’est pas unepipe.” This is a wedding. This is not a wedding. As an artist, the art becomes more real for me than life, a strange hyper-reality. I am more me, playing Grandma Nunzio, than later, make-up washed off. More on this later.

“Just like a real wedding… only funnier.”– Chicago Tribune

Tony n' Tina’s Wedding is a one-of-a-kind night of entertainment – an immersive comedy show staged as an evening of nuptials for two Italian-American families. It invites the audience to actively … READ MORE